


You Were Wonderful

by one_of_those_crushing_scenes



Category: Avengers (Comics), Black Widow (Comics), Marvel 616, Winter Soldier (Comics)
Genre: Dancing, F/M, Flirting, Fluff, Kissing, One Shot, POV Bucky Barnes
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-01-10
Updated: 2019-01-10
Packaged: 2019-10-07 23:59:13
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,993
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17375669
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/one_of_those_crushing_scenes/pseuds/one_of_those_crushing_scenes
Summary: Bucky feels out of place at a fancy dinner celebrating the Avengers' 15th anniversary, but sitting next to Natasha can't help but lift his spirits.





	You Were Wonderful

**Author's Note:**

  * For [jensenackals](https://archiveofourown.org/users/jensenackals/gifts).



“...each and every one of you,” Steve says.

Natasha leans close to Bucky and whispers, “So, who do you think is going to attack tonight?”

He looks around the room. It’s a celebration sponsored by the city in honor of the Avengers’ 15th anniversary, and there are more superheroes just in his line of sight than he’s ever seen in one place. He shakes his head. “Anyone who’d attack a hall with all these Avengers in it would have to be out of their mind.”

She gives him a grin that nearly leaves him breathless. “So I’ll put you down for fifty on the Green Goblin?”

He can’t help the laugh that escapes him. Someone at the next table glares. At the front of the room, Steve is still talking. Bucky knows the speech by heart, having been the unwilling audience for the thirty-some-odd rehearsals until Steve was convinced he had the whole thing down.

He shouldn’t even be here. “It’s in honor of the Avengers,” he’d told Steve. “Not the behind-the-scenes assassins who were on an unofficial team for a very short time. While wearing someone else’s costume.” Steve doesn’t like it when he talks like that, like Bucky’s stint as Captain America is less legitimate than his or Sam’s, but Bucky’s gotten used to regarding that time in his life as a wonderful, fleeting dream.

“You have as much right to be there as anyone else,” Steve had insisted. “It’s for _all_ Avengers, not only the ones who’ve been on the roster the longest.”

Still, Bucky had hemmed and hawed until Steve had finally threatened to sic Sharon on him. Now he’s kind of glad he agreed, because Natasha is gorgeous in her getup—she’s always gorgeous, of course, but she's a _vision_ tonight. She’s wearing a knee-length, form-fitting crinkly black taffeta dress with low shoulders, and her hair, copper and smooth, is tied up in a low knot. The expanse of skin showing between her shoulders and her long, graceful neck has kept him staring all evening. He should probably be embarrassed, but he can't bring himself to stop.

Bucky, for his part, is wearing a three piece suit, custom-made because it’s not easy to find a suit off the rack with one sleeve three times the circumference of the other. His wrists are itching, and he tries to focus on Steve’s words and to ignore the suffocating feeling of formalwear that was made to his exact specifications but still doesn’t quite seem to _fit_ him.

Steve wraps up his speech, and the lights in the room dim. A holographic video pops up in the center of the room, a three-dimensional slideshow of the Avenger’s greatest hits, starting with an action shot of the original team.

“It was a beautiful spring day when five heroes joined together for a common purpose,” a narrator’s voice says over the flashing action shots of Thor, Hulk, Iron Man, Ant-Man, and the Wasp.

There's the sound of a chair scraping against the floor, and then Natasha’s sitting right next to him, and he can feel her breath in the shell of his ear when she leans over and whispers, “Janet still has that old costume with the helmet. Don’t ask me how I know.”

He looks at her, sees the spark of mischief in her eyes. She hasn’t looked at him like that in—well, since _before_. God, he misses her. She’s so close to him he can feel the warmth of her skin, and he misses her.

He’s almost positive that she knows about their past by this point, either by piecing together the clues or by regaining her actual memories somehow or another, but what he doesn’t know is how she feels about it. It’s fine, though. Maybe there’s a reason something always tears them apart every time they seem to have found happiness with each other. Maybe the universe doesn’t want them to be together. Maybe it’s safer, to be just friends.

The scene switches to one with the classic “Kooky Quartet”: Steve, Hawkeye, Scarlet Witch and Quicksilver. From there, the images flash quickly from one lineup to another, finally wrapping up with the current team.

A narrator starts talking about the Avengers’ notable history, all the most important enemies they’ve faced, throwing around names Bucky barely recognizes, from Korvac to Onslaught to Immortus to someone called The Beyonder. “Who are all these people?” he murmurs to Natasha.

“You never read your introductory packet when you joined?” She clucks her tongue playfully and shakes her head. “I had to take a written test before they let me join.”

He has a sly retort ready about how _his_ Avengers were too busy switching hideouts every few weeks to worry about introductory packets, but it hits too close to home. The memories of Natasha sneaking into the apartment, staying out of sight of his teammates, the way they would seal themselves off from the world and pretend that none of it existed, that there was just him and her and the cover of night— _that’s_ what he associates with his time on the Avengers. He lets the words die on his lips and glances back at the show.

“And when Captain America was unable to serve,” the narration is saying, “other heroes stepped in to fill the void.”

The projection shows a new image—him and Sam Wilson, side by side, in their respective Captain America guises. Sam with his mostly-white costume with the wings and the goggles, him in the sleek outfit he and Tony had come up with together.

“Mmmm,” Natasha says appreciatively. “That shield just makes everyone who holds it ten times more attractive, doesn’t it?” She bats her eyelashes at him exaggeratedly and adds, “That chest, those thighs. The ladies must have thrown themselves at you from dawn to dusk.”

She _knows_ what she’s doing, and it’s killing him, but he wouldn’t mind going out this way, the look she’s giving him. Then he catches a glance of something out of the corner of his eye, and he’s sure his heart stops for a second, because they have a clip up there of the two of them together, a fuzzy cell phone recording of his first outing as Captain America, when they teamed up to kick some A.I.M. ass. The scene ends as quickly as it begins, switching over to some big fight with the Hulk, and Bucky looks back at Natasha to see if she saw it. She’s still looking at him teasingly, her expression unchanged, and he takes a deep breath, turning back to the show.

—

There’s dancing later on in the evening, and he sits the first one out, but then Sharon approaches with her hand out, and, well—who is he to say no to a lady? The fact that Sharon would probably punch him if she heard him call him a lady is irrelevant. They share a pleasant dance, and then Sharon passes him off to Jessica Drew, another welcome reminder of his Avenger days.

“Wow, Bucky Barnes,” Jessica says, putting her hand on his shoulder. “It’s been forever. Three and a half apocalypses, at least.”

“How’ve you been, Jess?” Bucky asks. She’s right—he really doesn’t remember when the last time he saw her was. It must have been ages ago. Not since his so-called death, and maybe not even since his earlier so-called death.

“Busy,” she says, letting him spin her. “But when aren’t we?”

They dance for a few more minutes, and then the music slows down, and Natasha approaches and taps Jessica on the shoulder. Jess looks up, and they have one of those exchange that only close friends can pull off, a series of facial expressions that apparently constitutes an entire conversation. After a few seconds, Jess turns to Bucky, grinning, and says, “I leave you in her capable hands.”

Those capable hands brush his shoulders as Natasha steps in close. He takes a step, and so does she. Their movements are perfectly fluid, the two of them as in sync in the ballroom as they are on the battlefield. He can feel eyes on them around the room, but he tries to put everyone else out of his mind.

“No sign of Norman,” he points out.

“Yeah, I’ve got eyes on all the usual suspects,” she admits. “Just in case.”

“Fixing the game, Nat?” he says, raising his eyebrows. “You’ve got another think coming if you think you’re getting any fifty dollars out of me.”

“Ha!” She winks at him. “I’m just making sure nothing interrupts our dance.”

They’re nearing the edge of the dance floor, and as they turn, his hand slips across the back of her dress, accidentally landing right at the catch of her zipper, and she shivers visibly. Without thinking about it, his gaze rushes to her face, and their eyes lock.

She leans over slowly, her breath tickling his ear. “Let’s get out of here.”

—

Out on the balcony, under the stars, their mouths crash together. It’s a mess of lips and teeth and tongue, sloppy and wet and desperate. Her hands tangle in his shirt, run up his torso, and cup his face. Fingers pressed so hard against his jaw he’s certain they’ll leave marks.

All he can see is her, all he can hear is his heart pounding through his chest and Natasha’s groans as they tear into each other. God, it’s been so long.

So long. Suddenly, he feels like a bucket of water has been thrown over his head. He pulls back, panting. “Wait,” he says, shaking his head.

He takes a look at her, eyes sparkling and mouth swollen, lipstick nearly entirely rubbed off. “James—” she starts.

“I just...need to know,” he starts. “I'm not—I mean, it's okay if—”

She interrupts him, putting her hand on his chest. “Yes,” she says, though he hasn’t asked a question. “I remember.”

He takes a deep breath, relieved. Not that he wouldn’t have been open to starting over if she’d wanted to, but this makes things easier, he has to admit. “How?” he asks, out of curiosity. “What did it? Was it Weeping Lion? The Red Room telepath?”

Nat shakes her head. “None of the above.” She shrugs. “It was just...time. My brain put itself back together, the synapses healed, and...here we are.”

“Wow.” He never even considered that as an option.

“Yes.” Her hand slides up from his chest and snakes itself around the back of his neck. “So? Are we okay?”

Are they okay. He laughs in disbelief. “Is it my birthday, or...?”

She answers the question by pressing her lips to his, and they lose themselves in each other for a few more minutes. They’re forced by circumstances to stop making out when some other guests discover the balcony and it’s no longer a private hideout.

“Another dance?” Bucky asks, holding his arm out.

“I’d love to,” Natasha responds. She pulls a tube of lipstick and a compact from somewhere in her dress and takes a minute to fix her makeup, then slides her arm through his.

They make their way back toward the hall. As they step inside, a photographer from the Bugle holds up a camera at them. “Can I get a picture of the public’s favorite Avengers power couple?”

Bucky and Natasha exchange an amused look. “We are?” she asks.

The photographer nods. “We ran a poll. The two of you are in the lead, two years running.”

Bucky lets out a low whistle. “What do you know,” he says.

“I’m turning in my spy badge,” Natasha declares, laughter in her voice. “How did I miss that?”

It’s a rhetorical question, and the photographer holds his camera up again. “For our readers?”

“Of course,” she says. “We can’t disappoint our biggest fans.” She turns to Bucky and gives him a kiss on the cheek, and the flash goes off.

**Author's Note:**

> The prompts were "power couple," "comic fluff," and "reunion." I tried to get a little of all three--hope you like!
> 
> Title is from [the classic Eric Clapton song](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xl7Hd2r0LOs).


End file.
